Season-opening split
Men’s tennis team falls to E. Kentucky in first match, defeats King in second
Match 1: E. Kentucky 4, Liberty 3
Liberty University’s men’s tennis team fell to the Eastern Kentucky Colonels 4-3 on Saturday in a close fight to the finish in the opening match of the year.
The Colonels captured the crucial doubles point to take an early lead in the match when junior Sam Matheson and freshman Alex Poynter were taken down by Sebastian Mueller and Diego Asis, 6-2. King’s Diogo Soares and Indra Patwardhan defeated Liberty sophomores Diego Castano and David Bush, 6-4.
Return — Flames junior Sam Matheson fires back during opening weekend. Photo credit: Michela Diddle
“We had some leadership from our captains,” Head Coach Chris Johnson said. “(Senior Egon Samaai) and (Matheson), really went out and took care of business.”
Matheson won the top seeded match quickly 6-1, 6-3 to get the team rolling in the right direction.
Samaai had an up and down match but found a way to pull out a victory in the third set, 7-6 that was decided with a tight tiebreaker 7-4.
“That was a really big point in the match and it really swung the momentum our way,” Johnson said.
Unfortunately, the team was not able to sustain the momentum and was defeated in the fourth and fifth seed spots. Poynter lost in straight sets to Guillem Sanchis, 6-1, 6-3 and Soares defeated Eddie Gutierrez in three sets of play, 6-2, 6-7, 6-2.
Florian Graskamp clinched the winning point for the Colonels with his win over senior Jason Burgess in straight sets, 6-4, 6-0.
Liberty received its third point in the third slot on the team from Castano, who bested Ramon van Flymen in a three set battle, 6-4, 3-6, 6-2.
“Diego did a great job today,” Johnson said. “(He) had some ups and downs in his matches and fought really hard in his matches. Diego has really improved coming into this year, and really showed that today.”
Match 2: Liberty 5, King 2
The Flames tallied their first victory of the season late Saturday afternoon in a match-up against King University with a score of 5-2. The victory pushes Liberty’s record to 1-1 for the season.
Doubles team Poynter and Matheson started the match with Matheson serving three first game aces to set the trend for a strong second match of the season, winning 6-3. Samaai and Gutierrez triumphed over Moritz Poswiat and Luis Delgado by a score of 6-3.
“Alex (Poynter) and Ryker (Heller) came through with a win for us,” Head Coach Chris Johnson said. “We came out and we were a little bit nervous but we had a good day.”
Burgess took care of business in straight sets, beating Jannis Walter, 7-6(8-6), 6-3 for a fourth seed singles victory.
At the third singles spot, Poynter seized another point for the home team but not without some struggle after winning the first set, 6-4. Delgado rallied but fell short in the second set, 7-6 (7-1).
The match-sealing point came from the sixth singles matchup with freshman Ryker Heller edging King’s Pedro Gomes in straight sets, 6-0, 6-2.
With the Flames victory, Coach Johnson gained his 100th win, making him the winningest coach in Liberty men’s tennis history. Johnson passed his mentor, Carl Diemer (99 wins), an honor he described as bittersweet.
Liberty hosts Furman Friday Feb. 5 at 2 p.m. at the Sports Racket in Lynchburg. It is the first meeting between the two schools.
COLLIER is a sports reporter